
FPGA?
Maybe they were looking to buy Altera(?)
Brit chip designer Arm is reportedly the latest to make an attempted play for Intel's product division. Or, at least that's what unnamed sources have told Bloomberg, which claims that Arm's supposed offer was rebuffed by Intel execs who said the division isn't for sale. The Softbank-owned outfit, apparently, wasn't interested …
I raise a eyebrow in reading that report and it hasn't been covered anywhere. A interesting acquisition, I'm wondering if we will eventually see it acquiring licenses to manufacturer a much wider array of computer processors in the coming years. At least enough capacity, we can supply the military ourselves and not rely on imports from Taiwan and US.
I also wonder if eventually it be transferred to the sovereign wealth fund to run rather than kept at the MOD. The sovereign wealth fund would have more interest in expanding it beyond just military applications.
It's not a logic fab, it makes Gallium arsenide (GaA) semiconductors, which are mainly used for radio amplifiers and a variety of FETs.
GaA RF amplifiers are used when you want low noise and to only amplify a very narrow frequency, otherwise you can use GaN RF amplifiers which produce more noise and have a wider amplification band, but are more heat tolerate and cheaper.
For logic the UK and US use BAE Systems who offer radiation hardened versions of GlobalFoundries's 45nm (RH45) and now 12nm (RH12) nodes, they are made in GF's fabs in the US.
"Sure, Arm's market cap exceeds Intel's by a significant margin at $152 billion vs $101 billion. But, as wild as that fact is, that's about all Arm has going for it, in terms of acquiring a target like Chipzilla.
In the second quarter of 2024 alone, Intel products drove $11.8 billion in revenues and had an operating income of $2.9 billion.
Arm, by comparison, netted $3.23 billion in revenues and $111 million in operating income — $306 million net income — in the entirety of its 2024 fiscal year.
So, Arm is valued far higher than Intel, yet Arm is actually tiny in comparison to the behemoth that is Intel both in staff/facilities and most especially in the financials?
The stock market never ceases to amaze me.